Death Note

Death Note is a top-notch 37 episodes noir anime, produced in 2006 under the egide of madhouse Studios and directed by Tetsuro Araki with great artistic value!

Watch Death Note! It's worth it!

Death Note Review

Death Note is a top-notch 37 episodes noir anime, produced in 2006 under the egide of madhouse Studios and directed by Tetsuro Araki. After i watch Death Note I realized it has one of the best artistic value I have ever seen in a serie, either animated or otherwise!

The story, adapted from the Death Note manga by Tsugumi Obha, depicts the chain of events that begins with:

1) a notebook falling from the sky... But not an ordinary one... this notebook was lost by a shinigami, a death god, and it gives a macabre power to it's owner... the ability to kill anyone by writing it's name.

2) The Death Note being found by a brilliant but twisted Yagami Light, an high-ranking student that decides to get rid of all the evil in the world;

3) The appearance of Ryuk, the original shinigami owner of the death note (or is he? ^_^) in the human word;

Imagine for some seconds... What would you do if you found a book like this? If you had the chance of using the Death Note without being found out, would you do it? And if so, who would you kill? Perhaps someone that made you harm or that hinders you in some way?

These are, of course, linear thoughts. Yagami Light is not linear. Everything he does, from the simplest actions to killing someone is extremely well planned and according to his agenda (getting rid of all evil, remember?).

One of the many things that makes this anime brilliant is showing the viewer how Light thinks. He is a cold genius that received a god's power and will stop at nothing to achieve is goals. And that is scary (and downright cruel at times)...

Death Note is unique in many ways. I can describe it as belonging to the sadistic suspense genre, where the nature of humanity is constantly being put in check. It shows the thin line that separates good from evil, in fact questioning even our ability to decide between what's right and wrong in this world.

The suspense I talked about is mainly created due to the complex relationships and ongoing intellectual duels carried out between machiavelic Light and L- also a super gifted prodigy sided with the forces of Law.

Lis the other star of the anime. Contrary to the cool Light, that is always finely dressed and with a clean look, L has a clumsy appearance and bizarre ways. But, my God, his mind works like a Swiss Clock!

And he puts all the energy of that brain to work on a goal: finding Kira (the codename that Light uses) and stopping him, with the help of all the resources of technology available to him by the polices of the world.

So it's basically a cat and mouse game between brilliant mind and supernaturalpower vsbrilliant mind and technology. In the middle you'll also have lots of other cool characters that interact with both sides of the barricade in surprising ways. The result you have to see!

Of course, not only plotline makes a good anime. But thankfully, Death Note excels in the animation and music department as well! It has some of the best anime openings and endings of all times (the Nightmare themes are quite notable) and the artistic darker tone used is modern, cool and suits the show perfectly. Yoshihisa Hirano and Hideki Taniuchi did a marvelous job in creating a soundtrack that's eerie and hypnotic that elevates the creepy feeling of the show and never fails to give a shiver to the viewer just at the right moment.